Introduction
The Community was founded by Anton Wallich-Clifford in 1963 and is a registered charity. Anton's vision for Simon was to reach out to the homeless and rootless, to be a movement of concern and, by working as a community, to offer a radical alternative to institutional care.
We still follow that philosophy today, offering a variety of services for rough sleepers and other homeless people.
Simon's aim has always been to provide help for people who are not provided for by other services. While provision for people sleeping rough in London has certainly increased in recent years, it is generally acknowledged that services are still failing to reach all those who need help and that it is often the most vulnerable who are not being reached. In some respects this is a question of trust and confidence; people who find themselves living on the street are often distrustful and understandably wary about those from whom they are willing to accept help from. Simon has a special role to play in this. We enjoy a high reputation among many of London's street homeless and are well known and trusted. This trust places a great responsibility on us, both to provide what help we can and to do it with care and respect for those we are here to serve.
We aim to break down the barriers between helping and being helped – our houses are homes, not hostels. Simon's residents and volunteers live and work together as a community and share in the decision making and running of all our projects.
The Community works through a variety of meetings so that everyone can be involved in deciding how our services operate. It is slow and can be inconclusive, but it works. Our residents are expected to contribute to the overall running as much as they can and this means in practice that current and ex-residents take responsibility for many of the day-to-day tasks.